Maybe Isiah makes indefensible trades, and maybe his free agent signings are routinely ludicrous, but you have to hand it to his drafting abilities. His last four lottery picks were Damon Stoudamire [Raptors, '95], Marcus Camby [Raptors, '96], T-Mac [Raptors, '97] and Channing Frye [Knicks, '05], who's legitimately good, much to my surprise. In other words, 4-for-4. And none of them were easy picks, except Camby.

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SportsGuy said:

But what if [Phil Jackson]'s secretly sitting on a giant book contract about this season, and he's been secretly taking copious notes the entire time? So he makes $10 million from the Lakers and another $5 million from the best-selling book, tentatively titled, "Mamba and Me: My Season Coaching a Guy Who Nicknamed Himself After A Deadly Python." And then he's out the door on July 1 and living in Malibu in a much bigger house, along with his butler, Charley Rosen. I think this could have some legs.)

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SportsGuy said:

We're coming up on the one-year anniversary of the immortal words, "It's time for the Birdman to fly."

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SportsGuy said:

Okur always looked like Chris Noth after an all-night drinking binge when he played for Detroit. Now he's the greatest Euro center since Arvydas Sabonis.

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SportsGuy said:

If Shareef Abdur-Rahim bought Google stock, would it immediately drop under $100 a share? If he joined the cast of "Lost," would the show immediately start sucking? What are the limits of his powers?

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SportsGuy said:

A.I. definitely cracks the starting five of my "We'll Never See Another Player Quite Like This Again" Team, along with McHale, Barkley, Magic and Gervin. Those have to be the five most unique players of all time.

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SportsGuy said:

It's incredible what facial hair can do for some people -- heck, it even worked for Brian Austin Green. In Gasol's case, he went from "Spanish metrosexual center" to "rugged big man you could see chopping wood in one of those plaid winter jackets" in no time whatsoever. Brilliant move. Suddenly he's a 20-10 guy.

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SportsGuy said:

[Lebron]'s a guy who sees the court like Magic and used to delight in setting up his teammates ... now he's hoisting up 29 shots in some games? What happened to the guy who made everyone else better? Remember the days when we wondered whether he would average a triple-double for a season? Long gone. Honestly, I liked watching him more as a rookie.

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SportsGuy said:

Blount makes a jumper with 0.8 seconds remaining to put the Celtics up by one. The crowd goes crazy. Pierce jumps on Blount, knocks him over and then everyone else pig piles on them. Meanwhile, the Pistons are watching this whole thing unfold and thinking, "Um, we still have one second left and Rip Hamilton's on our team." ... The lesson, as always: Don't pull that crap with the Detroit Pistons.